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Look for John McGraw Memorabilia:

John McGraw

For many years John McGraw was the dominant figure in American baseball. He was an
excellent player - certainly the best ever to become a great manager - yet his success
derived from more than athletic talent. He had a profound understanding of the game
and was alert to all the opportunities each inning offered. "The main idea," he always
said, "is to win."

His personality was indeed that of a "Little Napoleon": arrogant,
abrasive, and pugnacious. He outgeneraled his opponents while abusing them verbally
and, sometimes, with his fists. His players suffered his tyranny as the price of
victory, proud to be Giants. In his 29 full seasons as Giants manager he finished
first or second 21 times, winning 10 pennants and three World Series.

McGraw's
rise to prominence was swift. A scrawny youngster from Truxton, New York, he began
his professional career at Olean (New York-Penn League) in 1890 and within a year
had jumped to the American Association's Baltimore club. When the American Association
collapsed after 1891, Baltimore was absorbed into the National League and McGraw
became a member of the soon-to-be-legendary Orioles.

Although his ML playing career
spanned 16 seasons, McGraw was at his best as Ned Hanlon's fiery third baseman in
Baltimore, a star on a team that won three consecutive titles from 1894 to 1896.
A lefthanded batter, he was an adroit bat handler who could hit for average, batting
over .321 nine consecutive seasons. He twice led the league in runs and walks and
stole 436 bases. He and Willie Keeler were experts at the hit-and
run play.

McGraw
was notorious for blocking, tripping, or otherwise obstructing the baserunners while
the lone umpire watched the flight of the ball. Some say his shenanigans prompted
the stationing of additional umpires on the basepaths.

There then began a period
in which he successfully opposed the baseball "establishment" at every opportunity.
Barely 26 in 1899, he refused to be shifted to Brooklyn, which the Baltimore club
partially owned and wanted to strengthen. While manager Hanlon and five Orioles starters
led Brooklyn to the championship in 1899 and 1900, McGraw and catcher Wilbert Robinson
remained behind in Baltimore, where they owned a profitable saloon together. McGraw
was named manager of the leftover Orioles and led them to third place. The Orioles
were disbanded when the NL reduced to eight teams in 1900, and McGraw and Robinson
were sold to St. Louis. They agreed to go only on the condition that the reserve
clause be removed from their contracts, an unheard-of concession. In 1901 he became
player-manager of the new American League's Baltimore franchise, but after frequent
run-ins with league president Ban Johnson, a man as intractable as himself, he jumped
in mid-1902 to the NL's New York Giants.

McGraw brought Robinson, Roger Bresnahan,
Dan McGann, and Joe McGinnity with him to New York, and found Christy Mathewson already
there. With the ample financial resources of new owner John T. Brush, McGraw quickly
turned a floundering second-division team into a contender, winning a then-record
106 games and the pennant in 1904. McGraw and Brush refused to allow the club to
meet the AL champion Red Sox in the WS (the first Series had been played the year
before), however. In 1905 McGraw's Giants won a second consecutive NL pennant, finishing
105-48, and this time they did play the WS. They whipped the Athletics in five games
behind Mathewson's three shutouts.

McGraw's managerial style was reminiscent of
his antics as a player. He swaggered through every city in the league, battling opposing
teams, managers, owners, umpires, and league officials. He had a genius for inciting
crowds and the Giants quickly became the most despised team in the league, often
dodging rocks and bottles as they left enemy ballparks. In 1906 McGraw arrogantly
had "Champions of the World" emblazoned across the front of the team's jerseys.

Strategically,
McGraw favored the hit-and-run and disdained the sacrifice bunt. He had a sharp eye
for playing talent and traded daringly, getting useful work from drinkers and neurotics
other clubs had given up on. And with tips from his many friends in bush leagues
across the country, he found bright young stars to replace fading older ones.

McGraw's
Giants won three consecutive pennants from 1911 to 1913, but lost the WS all three
years, twice to the Athletics and once to the Red Sox. The 1912 WS featured Fred
Snodgrass's famous dropped fly ball, which allowed the Red Sox to rally for two runs
in the 10th inning of the final game. McGraw lost another WS to the White Sox in
1917, then rattled off four consecutive pennants beginning in 1921. By then, the
Yankees were emerging as an AL dynasty, but the Giants beat their Bronx rivals in
1921 and 1922, before the Yankees returned the favor in 1923.

McGraw unwittingly
hastened his own demise by urging wealthy Jake Ruppert to buy the Yankees, ushering
in the Ruthian long-ball era. The Yankees quickly
established themselves as the city's
dominant team, and the Giants were overtaken by the Pirates, Cardinals, and Cubs
in their own league. In 1932 McGraw surrendered the manager's reins to Bill Terry,
retiring with 2,840 victories. He returned in 1933 to manage the NL squad in the
inaugural All-Star Game.
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